Mobike share bikes in Beijing. The company said today it will launch its European expansion with 1,000 bikes on the streets of Manchester at the end of the month.
Photograph: Andy Wong/AP

In a move that has the potential to reshape the look and feel of many cities, one of China’s biggest “dockless bike share” companies, Mobike, will announce today that it will officially launch in Manchester and Salford.

The plan from Mobike – which operates 5 million bikes in China and is backed by Foxconn and internet giant Tencent – has the blessing of both city councils and Transport for Greater Manchester. It will kick off at the end of June with an initial 1,000 bikes and is likely to expand dramatically from there.

Unlike in most western schemes, where shared bikes are rented from docks, in China many urban residents instead find available bikes via GPS and an app, and then unlock it with their phone. The “Uber for bikes” model has also seen virulent competition and bikes littered haphazardly around cities or dumped by the hundreds in bushes and alleyways.

Mobike’s announcement means it will competing overseas with one of its most successful domestic competitors, Ofo, who are also gearing up for global expansion.

“I would like to be in at least three cities in the UK by the end of the year,” said Joseph Seal-Driver, Ofo’s UK operations director. “An obvious place to go is London. That’s where there are real problems with congestion and air quality, in particular.”

Ofo had in fact beaten Mobike to the British market, with roughly 50 bikes in Cambridge as part of a pilot programme, but has not yet determined when it will expand. In the Ofo system, riders pay 50p for 30 minutes, with no access fee. By contrast, London’s cycle hires cost £2 to access the system for a day, but the first half hour of each ride is free, and users pay £2 for every 30 minutes thereafter.

Beijing-based bike share company Ofo has started on a small scale in Cambridge, but has ambitious expansion plans

Mobike has not yet announced pricing details for its Manchester launch.

The new mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, called schemes like Mobike’s “an untested idea in the UK”, and said he would keep it under review.

“As mayor, I want to see many more people swapping their cars for bikes,” he said. “We’re conscious that our city centre is a complex and busy area already, so TfGM has been working hard to establish a voluntary code of working with Mobike to make sure the service operates in a way that doesn’t inconvenience other road users, pedestrians or city centre traders.”

It is an untested idea in the UK and we will need to keep this under review

Andy Burnham

Another dockless bike sharing startup, YoBike, launched in Bristol last month with 500 cycles, and says demand more than doubled initial predictions. YoBike is clearly inspired by its Chinese competitors and its founder is from China, although the company has so far focused mainly on cities in Europe.

“There are lots of campaigns by London boroughs that want the current scheme to expand, but they can’t do it because they don’t have the money,” Seal-Driver added. “A lot of cities are asking us to come work with them.”

While “Boris bikes” were instrumental in increasing the profile of cycling in Britain, Seal-Driver said the system had serious limitations, such as limited geographic reach, slow expansion and bulky docking stations.

Users download an app that displays a map with the locations of the GPS-enabled bikes, then use their phones to unlock the cycle. When a rider reaches their destination, they are free to park the bike wherever they want, with no need to return it to a fixed docking point.

Ofo and Mobike both set their sights closer to home when they began international expansion, inaugurating their first bicycle fleets outside China in Singapore.

“No one really rode bicycles in Singapore, but the government wanted to encourage cycling to reduce congestion and promote healthier living,” said Yu Xin, co-founder of Ofo.

The company has about 6,000 bikes in Singapore, and there are about 20,000 trips per day on their bikes.

By the end of the year, Ofo plans to have operations in 20 countries outside China, mainly focusing on the US, Europe and south-east Asia, Yu said, although he declined to specify which countries. The company’s CEO, Dai Wei, has previously said that Ofo would target Japan, Spain, France, Germany and the Philippines, and Ofo already has bikes in the US, UK and Singapore.

In the US, many bikes have been placed on university campuses.

“Young people are more likely to adopt new methods of transportation, new technologies,” Yu said. “But we’re not limited to universities. Wherever there’s need, we will go there.”

Despite the often repeated mantra of trying to reduce congestion in cities, dockless bike share scheme have sometimes contributed to the problem.

In China, the companies saturated dozen of cities with bicycles in an all-out war for market share. While the goal was to ensure customers could always find a bicycle, the result was congested sidewalks and broken or unwanted cycles left in mangled piles.

In response, China’s government plans to issue national regulations this year, requiring companies to insure their users and holding them responsible for solving issues like reckless parking. Several cities in China already have local laws covering the bikes.

European cities could avoid similar problems by limiting the number of companies, Seal-Driver said, adding that a glut can form with just three to four operators vying for dominance in a single place. Mobike believes it has found a technological solution to maintaining order.

“We track user’s behaviour, and we can reward them for good behaviour or punish them for improper behaviour,” said Florian Bohnert, Mobike’s head of international expansion.

Mobike uses a credit score for each user, which fluctuates based on where they park the bikes or forgetting to lock it after a ride. Each rider starts off with a score of 100, and earns points for taking rides or reporting improperly parked bikes. If a user’s score drops below 80, a 30-minute ride will cost about £56 in Singapore.

But expanding overseas has not always been smooth. When Bluegogo tried to expand into San Francisco in January, it was met by stiff resistance from local politicians, who received complaints from city residents. Less than four months later, the company suspended its US experiment. Bluegogo declined multiple interview requests.

San Francisco also enacted new regulations on dockless bike sharing, and as the companies enter new markets, local governments are likely to respond with new laws.

Another issue is that many cities, such as New York or Paris, already have agreements with dock-based bike sharing programmes. Ofo and Mobike say they are not excluding placing bicycles in those cities.

Uber for bikes: how 'dockless' cycles flooded China – and are heading overseas

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“When we started in China, a lot of cities already had bike-sharing platforms with docks, but not many people were using them,” Yu said. “[Dockless bike sharing] is more convenient. You can ride to exactly where you want to go, and it’s much easier to sign up.”

Ofo is also open to including dock-based bike sharing programmes in its app, giving users more options and making paying more convenient, he added.

But not everyone in Singapore is eager to see the bikes, and many cities may not have the infrastructure, for decades centered on cars, to support a sudden influx of bicycles.

“I’ve seen a few people ride Ofo or Mobike here, but not many,” said Cao Haoqing, a scientist at Procter & Gamble. “It’s unsafe here because there are no bicycle lanes.”

The 32-year-old prefers to take the subway or bus, adding: “Singapore already has a problem with disorderly parking, and [Ofo and Mobike] are making the situation worse.”